In his final hours in the Oval Office, the outgoing
President grants a controversial last-minute pardon to Joel Backman, a notorious
Washington power broker who has spent the last six years hidden away in a federal
prison. What no one knows is that the President issues the pardon only after
receiving enormous pressure from the CIA. It seems Backman, in his power broker
heyday, may have obtained secrets that compromise the world’s most sophisticated
satellite surveillance system.

Backman is quietly smuggled out of the country
in a military cargo plane, given a new name, a new identity, and a new home
in Italy. Eventually, after he has
settled into his new life, the CIA will leak his whereabouts to the Israelis,
the Russians, the Chinese, and the Saudis. Then the CIA will do what it does
best: sit back and watch. The question is not whether Backman will survive — there
is no chance of that. The question the CIA needs answered is, who will kill
him?